Helen passed into a pale windy world one February morning and walked
slowly down the track. There was no sharpness in the air and the colours
of approaching spring seemed to hover between earth and heaven, though
they promised soon to lay themselves down to make new green and splendid
purple and misty blue. Slow-moving clouds paced across the sky, and as
she looked at them Helen thought of Zebedee sailing under richer colour
and with white canvas in the place of clouds. She wondered if time crept
with him as slowly as it did with her; if he had as much faith in her
courage as she had in his return. She knew he would come back, and she
had trained herself to patience: indeed, it was no hard matter, for hers
had always been a world in which there was no haste. The seasons had
their leisured way; the people moved with heavy feet; the moor lay in
its wisdom, suffering decay and growth. Even the Brent Farm cattle made
bright but stationary patches in the field before the house, and as she
drew nearer she came upon John and Lily leaning on a fence. Their elbows
touched; their faces were content, as slowly they discussed the fate of
the cow they contemplated, and Helen sat down to await their leisure.
Before her, the moor sloped to the road and rose again, lifting
Pinderwell House on its bosom, and to her right, from the hidden
chimneys of Halkett's Farm, she could see smoke rising as though it were
the easy breath of some monster lying snug among the trees. There was no
other movement, though the sober front of Pinderwell House was animated
for an instant by the shaking of some white substance from a window.
Miriam was at her household tasks, and Helen waved a hand to the dark
being who had made life smoother for her since her night of stormy
weeping. She waved a hand of gratitude and friendship, but the signal
was not noticed, the house returned to its discretion, John and Lily
talked sparsely but with complete understanding, and Helen grew drowsy
in the sunshine. She was happier than she had ever been, for Zebedee had
laid peace on her, like a spell, and the warmth of that happiness stole
up from her feet and spread over her breast; it curled the corners of
her mouth so that John, turning to look at her, asked her why she
smiled.
"I'm comfortable," she said.
"Never been comfortable before?"
She gave him the clear depths of her eyes. "Not often."
He went away, driving the cow before him, and Lily stood looking after
him.
"He's wonderful," she said. "He comes along and takes hold of things and
begins to teach me my own business."
"So you're pleased with him?" Helen said demurely.
"Yes," the other answered with twitching lips, "he's doing very well."
Her laughter faded, and she said softly, "I wonder if they often
happen--marriages like ours."
"Tell me about it."
"Nothing to tell. It's just as if it's always been, and every minute it
seems fresh."
"No," Helen said consideringly, "I shouldn't think it often happens.
I've come for a pound of butter, please."
"How's Mrs. Caniper?"
"She's better, but I think she would be rather glad to die. I let her
make a cake yesterday, and it did her good. Come and see her soon."
"I will. Let's go to the dairy. Will you have it in halves or quarters?
Look at my new stamp!"
"What is it meant to be?"
"Well! It's a Shetland pony, of course."
"I like the pineapple better. I don't think a pony seems right on
butter. I'll have the pineapple."
"John says there's as much sense in one as in the other, because we
don't get butter from either of them."
"The pineapple is food, though."
"So's the pony, by some accounts!" She leaned in her old attitude
against a shelf, and eyed Helen nervously. "Talking of ponies, have you
seen anything of these ghostly riders?"
"I don't know what they are."
"That's what my--our--shepherd calls them. He saw them late one night, a
while back. One was a woman, he said, and the air was cold with them and
set him sneezing. That's what he says."
"It was some of the wild ponies, I suppose."
"Maybe."
"You don't think it was really ghosts?"
"No, for I've seen them myself." She paused. "I haven't said anything to
John, but I'm wondering if I ought."
"Why not?"
Lily's gaze widened in her attempt to see what Helen's point of view
would be and she spoke slowly, that, if possible, she might not offend.
"It was George Halkett I saw. There was no woman, but he was leading one
horse and riding another. It was one night when John was late on the
moor and I went to look for him. George didn't see me. I kept quiet till
he'd gone by. There was a side saddle on the led horse."
"Well?" Helen said.
"That's all. I thought you ought to know."
In that moment Helen hated Lily. "Is it Miriam you're hinting at?" she
asked on a high note.
"Yes, it is. You're making me feel mean, but I'm glad I've told you.
It's worried me, and John--I didn't like to tell John, for he has a
grudge against the man, and he might have made trouble before he need."
"I think that's what you're doing," Helen said.
"That may be. I took the risk. I know George Halkett. Miriam, having a
bit of fun, might find herself landed in a mess. I'm sorry, Helen. I
hope I'm wrong."
Helen was half ashamed to hear herself asking, "How late was it?"
"About twelve."
"But I'm awake half the night. I should have heard. Besides--would there
be any harm?"
"Just as much as there is in playing with fire," Lily said.
"'Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth,'" Helen said,
looking at the ground.
"Yes, but there's more than a little fire in Miriam, and George
Halkett's a man, you know."
Helen raised her head and said, "We've lived here all our lives, and we
have been very lonely, but I have hardly spoken to a man who was not
gentle. John and Rupert and Zebedee and Daniel, all these--no one has
spoken roughly to us. It makes one trustful. And George is always kind,
Lily."
"Yes, but Miriam--she's not like you."
"She's much more beautiful."
Lily's laughter was half a groan. "That won't make George any gentler,
my dear."
"Won't it?"
Lily shook her head. "But perhaps there's nothing in it. I'm sorry to
have added to your worries, but Miriam's so restless and discontented,
and I thought--"
"Ah," Helen interrupted gladly, "but lately she has been different.
Lately she has been happier. Oh!" She saw where her words had led her,
and with a little gesture of bewilderment she turned and walked away.
Perhaps, after all, the things that happened were not necessarily best,
and for the first time Helen felt a blind anger against the unknown. In
a moment of sharp vision, she saw what this vaguely concentrated life
had done for her and Miriam, and she wondered by whose law it had been
decreed that no human being could have a destiny unconditioned by some
one else, and though she also saw that this law was the glory as well as
the tragedy of life, she rebelled against it now, lest the radiant being
whom she loved should be dishonoured or disillusioned.
Helen's firm curved lips took a harder line as she went slowly home, for
it seemed to her that in an active world the principle of just going on
left all the foes unconquered and ready for the next victim who should
pass that way.
She slept fitfully that night, and once she woke to a sound of galloping
on the moor. She knew it was made by more animals than two, yet her
heart beat quickly, and her thoughts sprang together to make a picture
of George Halkett leading a horse without a rider through the night,
waiting in the darkness with his ears stretched for the sound of one
coming through the heather.
She started up in bed, for the mysterious allurement of George's image
was strong enough to make her understand what it might be for Miriam,
and she held herself to the bed lest she should be tempted to play the
spy; yet, had she brought herself to open her sister's door, she would
have been shamed and gladdened by the sight of that pretty sleeper lying
athwart her bed in profound unconsciousness.
Miriam, whose heart was still untouched by God or man, could lie and
sleep soundly, though she knew George waited for her on the moor. The
restlessness that had first driven her there had sent her home again,
that, by a timely abstention, she might recover the full taste of
adventure, and that, by the same means, George might learn her worth.
She was a little puzzled by his behaviour, and she began to find
monotony in its decorum. According to his promise, he had taught her to
ride, and while all her faculties were bent on that business, she hardly
noticed him, but with confidence in her own seat and Charlie's
steadiness, there came freedom to look at George, and with it the desire
to rule the expression of his face and the modulations of his voice.
He would not be beguiled. "I'm teaching you to ride," he said, and
though she mocked him he was not stirred to quarrel. She was temporarily
incapable of realizing that while she learnt to ride, he learnt to
honour her, and found safety for himself and her in silence; nor, had
she realized it, would she have welcomed it. What she wanted was the
pleasure of being hunted and seeing the hunter discomfited, and though
she could not get that from him, she had a new joy when Charlie carried
her strongly and safely across the moor; again she knew the feeling of
passing through a void, of sailing on a thunder-cloud without hope of
rescue and careless of it, and she paid a heavy price when she decided
that it would do George good to wait in vain for her. She would not have
him disrespectful, but she desired him ardent; she wished to see that
stubbornly set mouth open to utter longings, and, when she went to bed
after a dull day, she laughed to think of how he waited and stared into
the gloom.
A fortnight passed before she stole out on a misty night and at the
appointed place found him like a grey carved figure on a grey carved
horse. Only his lips moved when she peered at him through the mist. He
said, "This is the fifteenth night. If you'd waited till tomorrow, you
wouldn't have found me here."
"George," she said, with her face close to his knee, "how unkind you are
to me. And, oh, George, do you really think I should have cared?"
In the mist, she, too, had the look of one not made of flesh and blood,
but she had no likeness to some figure carved: she was the spirit of the
mist with its drops on her hair, a thing intangible, yet dowered with
power to make herself a torment. So she looked, but Halkett had felt the
touch of her, and taking her by the wrist, he dragged her upwards while
he bent down to her.
"You--you--!" he panted.
"You're hurting, George!"
"What do I care? I haven't seen you for two weeks. I've been--been
starving for you."
She spoke coolly, with a ringing quality in her tones. "You would see me
better if you didn't come so near."
Immediately he loosened her without looking at her, and she stood
chafing her hands, hating his indifference, though she knew it was
assumed, uncertain how to regain her supremacy. Then she let instinct
guide her, and she looked a little piteous.
"Don't be rough with me. I didn't mean--I don't like you to be rough
with me."
He was off his horse and standing by her at those words, and, still
watchful for rebuffs, he took her hand and stroked it gently.
"Did I hurt you, then?" he said.
"Yes. Why are you like that?" She lifted her head and gave him the oval
face, the dark, reproachful eyes like night.
"Because I'm mad for you--mad for you. Little one--you make me mad. And
you'll never marry me. I know that. And I'm a fool to let you play the
devil with me. I know that, too. A mad fool. But you--you're in my
blood."
Softly she said, "You never told me that before. You needn't scold me
so. How should I know you wanted that?"
"You knew I loved you."
"No. I knew you liked me and I hoped--"
He bent his head to listen.
"I hoped you loved me."
His words came thickly, a muddy torrent. "Then marry me, marry me,
Miriam. Marry me. I want--I can't--You must say you'll marry me."
Keeping her eyes on him, she moved slowly away, and from behind
Charlie's back she laughed with a genuine merriment that wounded
inexpressibly.
"You're funny, George," she said. "Very funny. At present I have no
intention of doing anything but riding Charlie."
Through a mist doubled and coloured by his red rage, he watched her
climb into the saddle and, before she was fairly settled in it, he gave
the horse a blow that sent him galloping indignantly out of sight.
Halkett did not care if she were thrown, for his anger and his passion
were confounded into one emotion, and he would have rejoiced to see her
on the ground, her little figure twisted with her fall, but he did not
follow her. He went home in the rain that was now falling fast, and when
the mare was stabled he brewed himself a drink that brought oblivion.